Letter To The Editor – Mad As Heck
July 30, 2010 by eastwickpress · 1 Comment
Dear Editor:
When is someone in this state going to use some common sense? Lawmakers want to enact a law requiring teenagers to blow into a device to start their cars and then continue to blow into it every 30 minutes to keep their car running – all to prove they have not been drinking.
While I understand it is against the law to use a cell while driving, I am unclear as to how “fishing” around for a tube that has fallen on the floor or been thrown into the back seat is any safer than sending a text message while driving. What if your 30 minutes are up and you just happen to be on the Interstate doing 60 mph and someone is on your bumper or you are in the process of moving through an intersection or a railroad crossing or if this unit malfunctions at an inopportune time?
I don’t know about you, but if this happens to my child, I will sue every idiot involved with this idiotic idea! Maybe I should join the masses and move from this, the worst state in the union, and leave our leaders wondering why. Like it is so difficult to figure out.
Eric Vincent
Dyken Pond Road, Petersburgh
Well I’m not sure what law the writer is talking about but the Ignition interlock is part of Leandra’s Law for anyone not just teenagers who drives with children in the car and is DWI
From the Times Union 8/2/2010
Under the law, first-timers convicted of driving drunk with a passenger under 16 years old face 1 1/3 to 4 years in prison. The term could be up to 25 years in fatal incidents. Police also report violators to the statewide Central Register of Child Abuse and Maltreatment.
Starting Aug. 15, any misdemeanor or felony DWI conviction, regardless of whether children are in the vehicle, in New York will prompt installation of a breath-activated ignition interlocking device for any vehicle the driver owns or operates.
First-time offenders must have the device for six months; it stays in place for a year in felony convictions. The law covers cases dating from Nov. 19, 2009, when Leandra’s Law was signed, in which a sentence is imposed after Aug. 15, 2010. Convicted motorists who drive without the device face up to a year in jail, as do those who help drivers circumvent the technology.
The change was a component of Leandra’s Law, inspired by 11-year-old Leandra Rosado, who was killed on the Henry Hudson Parkway in Manhattan last Oct. 11. She was among seven children inside a car en route to a Bronx slumber party when driver Carmen Huertas, who was allegedly drunk, crashed the car. New York will be among 10 states with the interlock ignition requirement. Officials said New Mexico experienced a 35 percent drop in alcohol-related fatalities and a 37 percent drop in DWI recidivism when it began mandating the installation of ignition interlocking devices.